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Ben Kuroki, a farm boy from Nebraska and the only Japanese-American believed to have flown over Japan during World War II.Credit US Army Air Corps

Ben Kuroki, a decorated Japanese-American gunner in the Army Air Forces of World War II, who was hailed on the American homeland at a time when tens of thousands of Japanese-Americans were confined to internment camps as supposed security risks, died on Tuesday in Camarillo, Calif. He was 98.

His death was confirmed on Saturday by his daughter Julie Kuroki.

Many Americans of Japanese descent served with distinction in the Army’s ground forces. But the Air Forces had not wanted Mr. Kuroki, or, for that matter, any Japanese-Americans.

He nonetheless became an airman and received three Distinguished Service Crosses, taking part in raids over Europe, North Africa, and then, after receiving special permission from the War Department, in missions over Japan.

In the decades following the war, Mr. Kuroki faded from the public eye. But in his later years, he was recognized anew.

The New York Times recalled in an editorial on Dec. 7, 1991, the 50th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, how “Gen. George Marshall asked to meet him; so did Generals Bradley, Spaatz, Wainwright and Jimmy Doolittle.”

The Public Broadcasting Service saluted Mr. Kuroki in a 2007 documentary, its title reprising the nickname bestowed on him by a fellow bomber crewman: “Most Honorable Son.”

A campaign on Mr. Kuroki’s behalf by veterans he served with brought him the Distinguished Service Medal in 2005.

“I had to fight like hell for the right to fight for my own country,” Mr. Kuroki said at the award ceremony in Lincoln, Neb. “And I now feel vindication.”

Mr. Kuroki, who was born and raised in Nebraska, a son of Japanese immigrants, flew 58 bombing missions.

He was saluted by Time magazine in 1944 under the headline “HEROES: Ben Kuroki, American” and he was fully accepted by his fellow crewmen.

While on home leave, he visited internment camps to speak of service to the nation, embodying patriotism in the face of wartime passions that demonized those of Japanese descent, many of them American citizens.

Ben Kuroki was born in Gothenburg, Neb., on May 16, 1917, and grew up in Hershey, Neb., one of 10 brothers and sisters in a farm family. Soon after America entered World War II, he joined the Army Air Forces, together with his brother Fred. It was rejecting Japanese-American enlistments, but a draft board official signed the brothers up for that branch anyway.

Ben, only 5 feet 5 inches, wanted to be a pilot, and Fred hoped to be a navigator. But the brothers were ostracized by fellow trainees and confined to menial duties in camp. Fred was transferred against his will to the Army’s engineers. But Ben was so passionate in his quest to fly that he was allowed to go overseas with the 93rd Bombardment Group, which flew B-24 Liberators, after being dropped for a time from its roster. He was a clerk at first but took machine-gun training and began flying on raids.

Sergeant Kuroki took part in the August 1943 raid on the Ploesti oil fields in Romania that fueled the German war machine. After completing the 25 missions required before reassignment, he volunteered to keep flying and was allowed five more missions.

On his 30th bombing run, over Münster, Germany, his oxygen mask was punctured by flak. A crewman saved him by placing a spare mask over his face.

In February 1944, when Sergeant Kuroki was on leave at a reassignment center in Santa Monica, Calif., he spoke to the prestigious Commonwealth Club of San Francisco, whose members included leading businessmen, educators and journalists.

“When you live with men under combat conditions for 15 months, you begin to understand what brotherhood is all about, what equality and tolerance really mean,” he said.

He received a prolonged ovation.

At his speaking tour of internment camps that followed, he was praised by some for his patriotism but resented by others who were embittered over their confinement.

Japanese-Americans notably served in the Army’s 442nd Regimental Combat Team during the Italian campaign, and in its Military Intelligence Service, translating Japanese documents and interrogating prisoners of war while accompanying their fellow soldiers and the Marines in Pacific combat.

But there were only a few Japanese-Americans who somehow slipped through the Army Air Forces’ enlistment ban and served in combat crews. And Sergeant Kuroki’s commanders had rejected his request to fly in raids over Japan, evidently reflecting a fear concerning the fate that would befall a Japanese-American, and any family members in Japan, if captured.

But War Secretary Henry L. Stimson, citing Sergeant Kuroki’s “splendid record” in air combat, made an exception for him at the behest of a Nebraska congressman.

“I have the face of a Japanese but my heart is American,” Sergeant Kuroki was quoted as saying by The Omaha World-Herald when he learned of the decision.

He became a gunner in the 505th Bombardment Group, flying in B-29s based on the island of Tinian, and participated in 28 raids over Japan, including the firebombing of Tokyo in March 1945. His fellow crew members honored him by naming their bomber “The Honorable Sad Saki.”

But in the war’s final weeks, a drunken serviceman enraged by Sergeant Kuroki’s Japanese background stabbed him in the head in his barracks. A fellow airman intervened to save him.

Mr. Kuroki received a degree in journalism after the war from the University of Nebraska and was a publisher, editor and reporter for small newspapers.

In addition to his daughter Julie, he is survived by his wife, Shige; his daughters Kristyn Kuroki and Kerry Williams; a sister, Rosemary Ura; four grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

Mr. Kuroki’s story was recounted by Ralph G. Martin in the 1946 biography “Boy From Nebraska.” Bill Mauldin, the Army sergeant who created the cartoon infantrymen Willie and Joe, wrote the introduction, reintroducing an improbable hero of the air war.

As he put it: “It is the story of a little guy who went through the war, made his buddies proud to wear the same uniform he did and will make you proud to be his countryman.”